St Helens schools sign up for anti-bully app

An innovative scheme which allows children to report bullying on their mobile phones is being rolled out across St Helens.

All schools - both secondary and primary - have signed up to use a new safeguarding and prevention app called tootoot.

The national initiative, supported by Hollyoaks and Casualty actor Will Mellor, gives young people an online platform to securely and anonymously report any incidents direct to their place of learning.

Coun Jeanette Banks, cabinet member for Education and Lifelong Learning, said: “Having measures in place to prevent all forms of bullying, and a clear process for reporting incidents, is incredibly important for the safety of vulnerable children.

“Tootoot is an effective tool to help in these situations and, by giving all education settings in St Helens access to this platform, we will have a much better idea of the scale of a particular problem.

“Hopefully we will see a significant reduction in the number of cases as our knowledge and understanding increases.”

The tootoot app is available 24/7, 365 days a year and is part of a suite of resources which schools can use to ensure that pupils make some noise about bullying issues.

There will be launch activities in secondary schools during National Anti-Bullying Week (16 to 20 November) - while the primary phase of the programme will be rolled out during December 2015.

Tootoot developer Michael Brennan, said: “Modern bullying comes in many different shapes and sizes. But whatever its form, it is a subject that is often very difficult to talk about if you become a victim.

“That’s why I developed tootoot - and by rolling it out to all of these schools it will give a huge number of young people the confidence to report what is happening to them.”